Flap in Noe Valley Over Shelter Plan For Young Gays / Objections to busing in homeless

John Wildermuth, Chronicle Staff Writer

Published 4:00 am, Monday, January 3, 2000

2000-01-03 04:00:00 PDT San Francisco -- A plan to bus homeless young gays and lesbians from the Castro to a new shelter in the Noe Valley is under attack by neighborhood groups.

Residents living near the proposed winter shelter at Metropolitan Community Church-Golden Gate, 1508 Church St., argue that it's the wrong facility in the wrong place.

"These are kids who want to be in the Castro, but instead they will be bused out here," said Tom Morgensen of the Noe Valley Community Workgroup, which represents residents and businesses in the area. "If you want to address the problem of homelessness in this neighborhood, you need a different type of shelter."

The group circulated an anti- shelter petition that was signed by 400 Noe Valley residents and the owners of 55 local businesses. The uproar already has delayed the planned December opening of the shelter and cut the size of the facility in half, from 20 beds to 10.

"We want to house 10 kids each night in a shelter that is modest, low-key and very neighborhood- friendly," said Tomas Lee, an aide to Supervisor Tom Ammiano, who is pushing to get the facility opened.

The cold-weather shelter, which would operate until May, is designed to serve the growing number of what city officials describe as "lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning young people" living on San Francisco's streets. Many of them are leery of spending the night in the city's other shelters, where their age and sexual orientation can make them targets for abuse.

Finding a place for those young people has been a constant struggle, said Supervisor Mark Leno.

"I've been very involved with the effort to create a permanent queer youth center," Leno said. "But getting any sort of a shelter open is very hard work because people have real concerns, real fears."

The Noe Valley residents are especially worried because of the problems the Castro had with a similar shelter last year.

Young people ages 18 to 23 were housed each night from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. at the Eureka Valley Recreation Center at Collingwood and 19th streets. Neighbors complained that the shelter brought more homeless young people to the area who all but took over the patio and stairs in front of the recreation center and adjacent Collingwood Park.

In a letter to the city in May, one resident complained of "an ever-increasing band of homeless kids who hang out literally all day on the (recreation center) steps, screaming, fighting, drinking, shooting up and hustling, among other activities."

While supporters of the shelter believe the neighbors' concerns were exaggerated, they admit that the flood of complaints forced them to look elsewhere this year.

"The shelter worked well while it was open, but problems started afterwards," Leno said. "We learned that the concerns of the neighbors must be addressed and must be answered."

That hasn't happened in the Noe Valley, said Gracie Atherton, who lives about a block from the proposed shelter.

There was little notice about the early meetings on the proposal, she said, and when residents did show up, "we got the impression this was a done deal."

"People assume that because we don't want the shelter, we don't care about homelessness," Atherton said. "But what we want is to be informed as a community."

The concerns about the gay youth shelter came as a surprise, admitted the Rev. Jim Mitulski, acting pastor of the church where the shelter would be housed.

"We underestimated the circumference of interest in the shelter," he said. "We thought it would only concern people a block or two around the church, but it's become an issue in the broader Noe Valley."

It's the type of shelter that will be opening that most concerns the neighbors, Atherton said.

Plans call for a van to take the homeless young people from the Eureka Valley Recreation Center to the Church Street shelter each night at 9:30 and return them to the Castro the next morning. Although it would be staffed by the pair of counselors, the shelter is designed as little more than a place to sleep.

"This won't be a lockdown facility, so there's nothing anyone can do about people leaving the shelter and hanging out," Atherton said. "People can walk outside and shoot up and nobody can do anything about it."

Drugs, alcohol and cigarettes won't be allowed at the shelter, drop-ins won't be admitted and if residents want to leave during the night, they won't be allowed back in, Mitulski said.

"With only 10 beds, this will have as small an impact as any sort of program can have," he said.

But that's not enough for the neighbors, who argue that any temporary shelter will bring the wrong type of people into Noe Valley, transients with few connections to the neighborhood. What they'd rather see is a 24-hour center, where homeless people would live, get the social services they need and prepare to live on their own.

"We'd like a facility where people could live full-time and work in the community," said Rachel Callaghan, another local resident. "The people on 24th Street are begging for workers."

The neighbors plan to meet with Ammiano this week and talk about their concerns. Ammiano's proposal to spend $73,000 in city money for the temporary shelter is slated to go to the Finance Committee of the Board of Supervisors on January 12 and then to the full board the following week.

"We're motivated to make this successful," Mitulski said. "We don't want to make a problem in the neighborhood -- we want to serve the city and the young people."

Faced with the neighborhood complaints, however, city officials already are working on a backup plan.

"I'm scouring the city, looking at other existing shelter space to find a place for gay and lesbian young adults," Leno said. "I'm trying to find 10 to 15 beds that would be secure."